The Innovative Capital Region
Berlin-Brandenburg
The German capital Berlin is located - as a federal country of its own - in the heart of Brandenburg. Closely connected, both federal countries form a metropolitan area with about 6 million inhabitants - the German Capital Region.
The German Capital Region - Berlin-Brandenburg
The Capital Region’s attractiveness for investors is attributable to its network of research and scientific institutes, its modern transport and communication infrastructure as well as its proximity to Eastern European markets. The concentration and quality of universities and non-university research institutions ranks highest in Germany and provides an excellent basis for business development. About 180.000 students at 28 universities build a highly skilled future labour force, providing a significant competitive advantage for the region's enterprises.
Concentration of research and development institutes in Germany.
The Joint Innovation Strategy Berlin-Brandenburg
In order to strenghten the economic potential in the region with special regard to innovative enterprises, a strategic political focus was put on the development of a joint innovation policy for the economic area Berlin-Brandenburg, in order to create the common Innovative Capital Region Berlin-Brandenburg. This process was accelerated in 2007 and led to a close and ongoing cooperation between different stakeholders forming the innovation policy of the region such as the Ministry and the Senate for Economics, the Ministry and Senate for Science and Education, Brandenburg Econonomic Development Board (ZAB) and Technologiestiftung Berlin (TSB).
So far, five innovative industry fields to be of particular importance and interest have been defined and developed. Each field introduced a field specific branch strategy (Zukunftsfeld-Strategie) in 2008. These constitute the core of a future joint innovation strategy for the Innovative Capital Region:
- Biotechnology, Medical Technology and Pharmaceuticals
- Energy Engineering
- Information and Communication Technology, Media
- Optics
- Transportation System Technologies.
A main objective of the future joint innovations strategy is the development of competitive clusters within these five innovation fields that have already established effective network structures and/or cluster initiatives in the region, today.
In addition to these five fields, horizontal industrial technology potentials such as e.g. advanced materials, IT, clean/green technologies will be developed in order to enable cross-innovation and development between the five main fields.
Furthermore, the general innovation-political framework of the region will be further developed in a joint effort by both federal countries. This framework will include these strategic topics:
- Harmonisation of incentive instruments for innovation and technology support
- Technology-transfer
- International networks and partnerships
- Developemnt of the regional innovation-infrastructure
- Marketing of the region's economic innovation potential
It is expected that Berlin and Brandenburg will pass the joint innovation strategy in the fall of 2010, providing the strategical framework for a common inter-co-ordinated innovation policy in the German Capital Region.